This invention relates to wood and metal products and, more particularly, relates to mass-produced, prefabricated modules for making the products
In the past, one-piece modules have been utilized to build final products, such as doors or drawers. For example, doors have been built with modular, vertically oriented stiles on both sides, wherein the stiles have a center panel fit between them by a tongue-and-groove arrangement, and wherein the top and bottom of the panel are capped with horizontal rails that are also attached by tongue-and-groove arrangements. The drawers can also be modular with each drawer's sides, front and back being prefabricated to a standard size. Each drawer piece is provided with mating channels at its ends, e.g., dovetail cutouts, for subsequent mating of the pieces and forming of the drawer's corners.
In order to reduce the size of the final products, these prior modules require trimming at their peripheries. This often destroys functional features along the module's rim, such as the tongue of a tongue-and-groove arrangement or the cutouts for a dovetail joint. For example, if a person wants to reduce the width of a drawer made with the prior art's prefabricated pieces, he needs to trim off an end from both the front and back panels of the drawer. In doing so, he also has to cut off the "joint" cutouts of both trimmed ends. Afterwards, the length of the front and back panels is reduced and the finished product will have a smaller width. However, before the panels can be assembled into a finished drawer, their trimmed rims have to be repaired or rebuilt so as to "put back" their functional features--here, the removed cutouts.
A similar problem arises with one-piece, final products that are not made of modules, such as wooden picture frames or doors with carved or routed designs. The outer dimensions of these products can only be reduced by cutting away from the products' outer edges or perimeters. This destroys the ornamental aspects along the edge, such as molding. Further, the functional aspects of the product can also be destroyed, as is the case when the product is a frame and cutting away of the frame's outer perimeter causes the frame's center mounting portion to be shifted out of its desired location.
Accordingly, it is the primary object of the present invention to introduce a new concept in modules for building final products, wherein the new concept permits a module to be easily trimmed and thereby reduced in length or width without destroying the functional aspects of the module along its rim.
It is another primary object to provide prefabricated, two-piece modules for building wood or metal products, wherein the size of the final product can be easily reduced by trimming away the modules at their centers, instead of at their peripheries, so as to reduce their lengths or widths but not destroy the functional aspects of the modules along their rims.
It is a more specific object to provide an adjustable module which is made of mass producible, left-hand and righthand sections that are joined at complemental, abutting ends by any suitable means (preferably dowels that fit into overlengthed channels in the complemental ends), wherein the overall length of the module can be reduced from its standardized or originally manufactured size by slicing the sections along their complemental faces prior to joining the faces together.
It is yet another object to provide two-piece modules, commensurate with the above-listed objects, wherein the size of some modules can be adjusted without destroying the ornamental aspects on their outer surfaces.
It is a further object to provide a new two-piece module which is simple to use, yet extremely durable and economical in design.
The above and other objects and advantages of this invention will become more readily apparent when the following description is read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.